use real butter

We had denied ourselves our favorite restaurant for far too long. It was time to go and tell Fumito that we bought a house, and that he needed to move his business to Boulder. Any one of my sushi-loving friends can tell you that this place is AMAZING. Fresh fish, incredible sushi, awesome price. It helps to have known the chef for over 12 years. We’ve had sushi in Auckland, Queenstown, Toronto, Seattle, Bellingham, Hilo, LA, SF, Santa Cruz, Denver, Boulder, Albuquerque (that was a mistake – but Jeremy was the one who ate there), Ithaca, Boston, Williamsburg, Atlanta – nothing compares to Ai. My girlfriend from Tokyo says it is the real thing. Tonight, Fumito was very happy to see us, and piled our plates with a lot of freebies, like toro (fatty tuna). This stuff is $6 a piece and he gave us 4!

He was also messing around back in the kitchen preparing seaweed and poke salad for us. Another one on the house! I’m very sad to be leaving these fellows. This is the absolute best sushi bar on earth. Sushi Zanmai in Boulder is good, but it ain’t no Ai. The softshell crab handrolls were to die for tonight.



Sushi is beautiful food.

Swung by the Chronicle to pick up a nice bottle of Sancerre for our realtor, but they didn’t have any in stock. Instead we got a lovely Chablis:

Looked so good, we got one for ourselves. We’ll drink it to celebrate the closing.

Food Trivia
Spinach was cultivated as early as 400 AD in what is now modern day Iran. It was imported into China a few hundred years later, and eventually introduced into Europe when the Moors invaded Spain. It has been called the “prince of greens”. The leafy green is touted for it’s iron content and was made famous by Popeye and his can o’ spinach. However, the calcium and iron contents in spinach, although high, are only partially absorbed by our bodies because another component – oxalic acid – binds to both, rendering them unusable. Spinach is an excellent source of vitamin A. I love spinach stir fried, raw, and cooked in a dozen wonderful dishes. The downside is that the yield of cooked spinach is 1/10 the initial raw state.

fry baby, fry

My current headache is a Sugar Headache… Trying to kick my general malaise, we drove into Pasadena tonight for some Really Delicious But Incredibly Bad For You food. Driving through Old Pasadena, it occurred to me that we rarely ever go out because we dislike the urban (if you can call gentrified Pasadena urban) atmosphere – especially the nightlife. I had to start off with a lime rickey and to coordinate the flavor theme, Jeremy opted for a true fountain lime coke.

**Jump for more butter**